Partial Redemption?
UPDATE: At the top this time. Here's the video. Bollinger did hammer Ahmadinejad. Gerard Vanderluen thinks Bollinger deserves an apology, too. I'm sorry, I still disagree. Yes, Bollinger smacked Ahmadinejad down hard - and it was well done. But I still do not believe the invitation should have been extended.
I can only go from the press reports since I did not see Lee Bollinger's opening statement for Ahmadinejad's appearance at Columbia. But it sounds as if Bollinger let him have it, astonishingly hard. So severely that it apparently shook Ahmadinejad and made him pretty angry.
Ahmadinejad smiled as Columbia President Lee Bollinger took him to task over Iran's human-rights record and foreign policy, and Ahmadinejad's statements denying the Holocaust and calling for the disappearance of Israel.
"Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator," Bollinger said, to loud applause.
He said Ahmadinejad's denial of the Holocaust might fool the illiterate and ignorant.
"When you come to a place like this it makes you simply ridiculous," Bollinger said. "The truth is that the Holocaust is the most documented event in human history."
Ahmadinejad rose, also to applause, and after a religious invocation, said Bollinger's opening was: "an insult to information and the knowledge of the audience here."
"There were insults and claims that were incorrect, regretfully," Ahmadinejad said, accusing Bollinger of falling under the influence of the hostile U.S. press and politicians.
"I should not begin by being affected by this unfriendly treatment," he said.
During a question and answer session with the audience, Ahmadinejad appeared agitated. In response to one question, Ahmadinejad denied he was questioning the existence of the Holocaust.
"Granted this happened, what does it have to do with the Palestian people?" he said.
I still do not believe Columbia should have invited him, but at least Bollinger didn't let Ahmadinejad simply control the event for maximum positive PR. It is, at best, only partial redemption, but it was a start at lease.
UPDATE: No, it's not. So what if Bollinger went after a man who should not have been on the stage in the first place? This is not a free speech issue, it is not an academic freedom issue. This is about right and wrong. And half a right doesn't make up for the intial wrong.
UPDATE: See Shrinkwrapped for a take on the "free speech" issue as well as a bit of perspective on counting coup. And just because I'm feeling snarky as heck about the whole thing:
By jpg, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 2:40 pm
I had daydreamed that something like what Bollinger and the audience did would happen, but I never gave it serious consideration. Nice to see some small bit of sanity occurred at Columbia.
By T-Steel, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 2:56 pm
Hello Gaius and thanks for reading my post.
We obviously disagree if President Ahmadinejad should have been invited or not. I have the a few other people higher on the “give no audience” list than Ahmadinejad (like some of those cold blooded African leaders that let holocausts occur every day in their country). But I’m hardly this charitable when it came to him visiting Ground Zero. There’s only so much this moderate can take.
By Gaius, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 3:04 pm
I know a number of people who are arguing that he should have been invited and allowed to speak for a lot of quite noble reasons. That doesn’t change my opinion on this guy though, sorry. I think he is really evil - and I mean that. I’m also concerned that he might take his “insult” from Bollinger in the worst possible way. This may have more negative repercussions than you think.
By vanderleun, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 7:53 pm
“This is not a free speech issue, it is not an academic freedom issue. This is about right and wrong.”
Again we come into the realm of the perfect being the enemy of the good. Republicans were far from perfect for many conservatives. Some even sat out 2006. Result. Less than good.
When you get down into right and wrong, you get into your right and your wrong and I respect that. I do. I like the BCB take on almost all things and rarely if every disagree . This is just one of those times and, in the grander scheme of things, I don’t think it is that big a deal.
You are correct that it was not a Free Speech issue. The government had no dog in this fight, although many had opinions. But the call was Columbia’s to make. And it may well be they made the wrong decision according to the lights of many. Lord knows I thought so for much of the week leading up to this. But I no longer think so.
I think what happened today was a classic example of good and right ideas and ideals exposing bad and wrong ideas and causing the monster to stand and reveal himself in many ways.
There are people who will see the news tonight and think again about the death dwarf of Iran. They won’t be from the right or the left, but from the center. Which is exactly what you want to have happen.
By Gaius, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 8:07 pm
Yeah, I can really see what other people are saying here. I also am seeing the left jumping madly about how “rudely” Ahmadinejad was treated. As did Mad Mahmoud himself. And I can see this backfiring. That, I think, is the real problem here. He was given a platform he did not deserve, did get somewhat rope-a-doped (Bollinger did a very nice job, I have to give him that). But the aftershock may not be worth it.
As to the right and wrong thing, I guess my personal standard on this issue is that I would not - ever - stand in the same room as that man. Yeah, it’s personal, yeah, some would consider it arbitrary.
But I grew up knowing a couple who had been in Auschwitz (they’d married after the war.) I came by that standard honestly.
By feeblemind, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 9:51 pm
Think Bollinger learned anything from this?
By Gaius, Monday, 24 September , 2007 @ 9:54 pm
No. No I don’t.